Flying with Morality
by Spunkay Skunk
Summary: He can't help but wonder, though, which of them is more honest – which of them is lying more. AU Slash.


Basically this AU ficlet is a short scene that was _supposed_ to lead into a story – which crashed and burned miserably in my head… While I have abandoned the idea, I'm still pretty satisfied with how this could-be introduction came out (even if it is fairly short) and figured: why not post it?

FYI: Suzaku is an airplane pilot in this story – as in commercial flights (maybe with some military background too? I'd like to think so). I just wanted to mention this because there is a tiny – one sentence – reference to his career and I didn't want anyone to get confused by that line.

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Flying with Morality

The hotel room – containing two souls, one asleep and one awake – is silent.

Although it's more of an absence of sound rather than just peaceful quiet that tends to the slumbering populations' wounds so they are refreshed for a new day of scathing. Connected to this room is a small balcony that sits seven stories up from the earth; the glass door is parted from the wall with the conscious character lounging on the line of inside and out. The air outside is warm and humid with a thickness that slathers and infuses itself to the skin exposed to its atmosphere. The air inside is cool and tonic, fluttering over every surface like a coated blanket that won't settle into place. Hot and cold play on this line between outside and in, blurring at the axis of the occupant riding their battlefield – whom sits with his back to the wall, his head turned only slightly to greet the night sky with his stoic gaze. In these city walls he can see nothing of the twinkling stars that children sing of, nor can he see the bright moon that beasts howl to. All he can see is the cloudy light from buildings beyond this room that swell the natural ceiling a dirty orange.

His hands are empty, his stare is empty, and his mind is empty. The sleeping body tucked between the floral bedspread – naked and unmoving – no doubt has more vitality in its mind than his. But he isn't sitting at this room's edge to ponder or philosophize of all that is lost and won. He just needs to sit and stare, stare up at that sky where all his burdens seem so tiny in comparison to assuring a safe voyage over the waters and lands that are connected by fault lines and memories in those speedy aircrafts.

His brown hair sits unruly on his head (but still behaving to the grooming he had implored for earlier with his tired hands) as he leans it against the metal track that shoots up the wall, and along the floor and ceiling of this median on which he is perched. One knee is pointed in the air while the other lays laggard on the concrete extension of this hotel room. His bent arm is balanced on that knee that resides on the same side of his body, his hand hanging with open fingers that trap the cooler air like sea anemone catch particles of food.

"You're letting all the cold air out," the should-be sleeping body utters plainly to him – a near chide, he understands.

"Why should you care? It's not like you're paying for it," he says likewise, a sneer hidden inside that deadpan demeanor stretched taut around his words.

_The_ _other _doesn't reply, doesn't move.

Not until a sufficient amount of estranged time scuttles by.

"Do you love her?"

He doesn't look to the question, to the clear, grave tone that sounds as empty as his mind had felt before _that_ voice spoke to him from that bed.

(There are so many words and thoughts left unsaid; so much knowledge that laces those four words that proves nothing is in need of explanation. All the things he could say, that either of them could say, are tied up tightly, knotting in that short question – _investigation_ – that he would be foolish to try and backtrack to a conversation that was never shared between them. The only thing that needs to seep past his lips is the answer – that being the only redundant response allowed for him to articulate.

His only chance, perhaps, to cut and run (even if it is given to him).)

He fights the urge to form a smile of any kind (wry, dry, small, sad, anything), "Of course I do." His voice, however, isn't as successful.

"Then why are you here?" – Still unmoving, in form and tone as _he_ lies in that bed.

He raises his brow a little to help his reply mosey out of his mouth, but it isn't until his shoulders rise and sink that it does, "A sort of 'goodbye,' I guess. A 'one last time' with you, I don't know…" He sighs quietly to himself, "It seems like you should know why."

He flicks his eyes to see the other's peer from inside the dark room, the glistening of city lights streaming through the window are glossed over them hiding their natural hue. He looks to perhaps see the retort or whatever _the other_ decides to say but he says nothing and remains motionless – unlike hours before, when in the early darkness of this room there wasn't a muscle left unused in that body.

He looks away from the mute, reflective gaze, "We're getting married, actually." He lobs his head to the side but his eyes stay stuck to the sky. "I'd invite you to the wedding, but, it would be rather hard to explain how I know you."

"As if I'd want to go," _Lelouch_ mutters stiffly with a turn of his head.

He lets himself smile then, although it is brief and almost completely non-existent, he lets himself smile.

"Yeah, all formal and boring. Not your thing." He glances back to the bed, at the silent face that ensues its snubbing after this statement. He realizes that his voice is probably too casual for this topic, but he hadn't planned any sweet partings – just the parting.

Suzaku stands from his halfway sitting and slides the glass door closed. He adjusts his apparel, straightening his clothes and rubbing out wrinkles as he allows that bed to pull him back into its orbit. He looks down at the man lying in this bed: his face aimed at the ceiling, his eyes (not yet free of mirrored lights, but that gemstone violet is seething and pushing around the highlights from the outside illumination) aimed at him, meeting Suzaku's gaze dead on without hesitation – a challenge. _Lelouch's _arms are plopped on the blanket over his chest as he lies flat on his back, his black hair neatly in place despite how messy and scattered it was when this bed was alive – when they were alive. Now the whole scene is calm in contrast to the restless air saturating the room; the two of them hurting and helping the flow, the feng shui torn between the listlessness of the bed dweller and the sobriety of the stander and not knowing which vibe to encompass.

Suzaku chooses to sit down on the bed, if nothing else, to keep his body from jutting into the confused mood; gently placing himself next to the skin covered statue lying off center on the full bed. Those eyes are still on him, watching all the words he won't say, all the thoughts left unsaid (everything not explained) rattle in his brain as he places one hand on the other side of _Lelouch's_ body for balance and descends his lips to touch _his_.

Four eyes close, four lips animate, two mouths open, two tongues astir, one heart pounds.

"I never loved you," the bottom pair state after the top pair parts from them with a scorn so deep on that face that it drowns his voice, soaking his words with sultry derision.

"I always hated you," he says more quietly, the disdain absorbed from his voice by the green sponges in his eyes that drip nothing but contempt into the violet ones below him.

He can't help but wonder, though, which of them is more honest – which of them is lying more.

* * *

…Maybe you can understand now why this died before it could even start. Or maybe you can't. At any rate, this is all that survived the wreckage.

And just _who _did Suzaku choose over Lelouch? I know who it is my head, but I'll leave it for you, readers, to decide. (It probably is very apparent and most likely the person you're thinking of… but I left everything very vague for a reason – which is kind of irrelevant at this point, I guess.)

Thanks for reading! Please review!  
-Spun_kay~_ Skunk


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